This question is towards the people that watch the movies, how would you describe Bella's personality traits in the Twilight movies? Facial expressions,mannerisms, way she talks,etc How would you honestly characterize her?
She had none. She had one facial expression throughout the film, and she had no personality to speak of. Basically, she's the perfect hollow character for a reader to perform wish-fulfillment to the max which is also why she was so loved by everyone. The only thing she could do was be miserable - that's the one thing she's good at. Be very, very miserable. And why is this under the punctuation and grammar subforum? Surely this should be in General Writing or Character Development!?
Bella is reserved and awkward. She never seems fully comfortable with anything, even when she's with Edward, the supposed love of her life. She relaxes an eensy bit as the movies progress, especially around Jacob (I guess that's why so many fans are "Team Jacob" lol). She's also very apathetic toward...well, almost everything.
INFP/ISFP Couldn't be sure as to which exactly, since I've neither watched the movies, nor read more than a few pages from the books. Just a quick guess from what I've gathered and the little I read in a short excerpt.
Wait, why are we talking about a wooden head again? Oh wait, Bella... umm let me see She's a terribly annoying character that was never developed and all she does is whine. Im starting to question why everybody loves that boring wooden head so much. She's annoying and bland. Why would you even bother with her? If your a fan of Twilight i don't mean to offend, but if you read other books in that genre, such as Sookie Stackhouse, you would understand why i called her a terrible character. You would think Sookie is your average dumb blonde, but really she's an independent, sarcastic, complicated and very emotional and not in the annoying way. If you never read the books, i will say there's quite a few scenes where you know... that three letter word. I don't like repeating it. But other then that it's a great series.
Thanks for the great feedback guys. Would you agree that there are vast similarities between her character Bella, and herself in real life? (Kristen Stewart). Because in one of the interviews I recall her saying that she essentially played herself in the movie. I've watched numerous interviews of Kristen Stewart and I definitely think that the differences between Bella and herself are subtle. Does anybody understand where I'm coming from? Does anybody agree? EDIT: Also, to everybody that said her performance in Twilight seemed 'hollow, I agree. Although I wonder how should she have acted INSTEAD for her performance to have been better? What could she have done differently? Thanks
Bella is fine as a character. People don't like a lot of her traits, and Twilight bashing is trendy, but in fact she's been tremendously successful as a character for a reason - people are able to relate and Meyer created a relatable character and story. Speaking about the first book, here. I thought Stewart portrayed her fine. Don't know how she'd do in other roles.
Are those two things meant to be connected? I'm trying to understand what the significance of the second part is...
Bella is a blank canvas to serve for the audience (movie, or book) to imprint themselves into a steamy unrealistic vampire romance. It's almost scientific how little personality she is given so that tweens across the land can tell each other how "alike" they are to Bella. It's both, honestly clever and startlingly manipulative. She is the given the mathematical least of personality one would have to have to be considered "a human."
She is a "vessel" for the reader to put themselves into. She is purposely vague in personality so that any young adult reader can feel as if they are Bella.
Based on her inner dialogue, I'd characterize her as introverted, intelligent, judgmental, cautious, and sensitive.
I've read the first book, and I've seen the first movie. I don't remember anything at all about Bella. I think that says something about her character.
She does seem pretty dull as I think about it, but yet in YA books, there are actually a lot of female protagonists that don't really stick out with any especially noticeable characteristics. Maybe that is so, like someone said above, the reader can imagine themselves in that role instead?
Some great points have already been discussed. I definately agree with MikeyFace, Bella is a blank canvas, that is why soooooooooooooooooooooo many girls across the globe feel they can relate to her. Each able to find a little piece of themselves in Bella. Stephanie Meyer was actually very clever in creating Bella this way (in my opinion) look at the millions of dollars she has made! I absoloutly ADORE twilight (team Jacob ALL the way!) even though I do find Bella a little annoying at times!
Her character is almost believable to me as a teenage girl up to the point when Edward leaves her. It is this mopey whoa is me attitiude that really kills any chance of the character for me. Not to say that a person can't relate to the emotion but come on how long did she sit there whining about Edward leaving her. The only saving grace is to her after this point is the spree of recklessness she goes on after she quits whining. Over all she is mildly believable to a certain point and then you slowly get sick of her character. While I do appreciate that Meyer tried to rewrite the standard vampire I just think she changed too much about them for someone like myself to enjoy. Which may have been countered in the end had Bella actually been a stronger woman and not the introverted and whiney teen she was. Yet you cannot fault her completely for Bella as she does just what a writer wants you to do and allows the reader to envision themselves in the character.
Exactly what MCKK said. She's an every person character that the reader can join in with. She has absolutely zero character change throughout the entire story, even when she becomes a vampire, she's the same person. And yes, I read every single one of the books and read every single 'glower'. Personally I liked the plot but thought the characters were all vapid and hollow. That said if I were going to really try and come up with something she's a self-centered girl who only cares about herself, leads people on, is completely flaky and can't make up her mind about anything unless its forced upon her and lastly is afraid of her own voice. She also has trouble completing sentences.
I found the traits that Kristen Stewart gave Bella particularly irritating. The mid-sentence pauses, the sigh at the end of every bit of dialogue, awkward pauses in movement, bland facial expressions...those irritated me. Having read some of the twilight series I found Bella's character introverted, clumsy, the redeeming quality of being fairly selfless until falling in "love" twice at which point she is too selfish, and socially awkward which, for some reason, seems to make her all the more attractive to her peers. It doesn't make much sense, but... As to whether or not Bella and Kristen are alike...I don't know Kristen so I couldn't say.
I have only seen the first three movies and have not read any of the books. She didn't seem that empty to me, to be honest. Yes, she lacked any real interesting personality, but I found her character to be too full of some kind of seething desperation for anyone to fit themselves into it. I think it left no room for any of her personality either. When angry she didn't seem angry. When hurt, she didn't seem hurt. She seemed desperate and maniacal.
It's also difficult to make a movie that is 99% internal dialogue. LOL. It just ends up being a lot of staring with no explanation --- which is what Twilight Movie ended up being, lol.
Given how much I love/hate the Twilight series, I can never decide if Meyer intentionally made Bella a blank canvas for teenage girls, wrote about what she thought a girl should be like (given her religious background), or just plain lucked out with bad writing that actually worked in her favour. I find Bella to be awkward, annoying, and far too depressing. I didn't empathise with her at all, and wanted to kick her in the shins more often than not. I now spend a lot of time discussing the series with my much younger nieces and their friends over why Bella is a very bad role model, and why there are so many things about the series that are not acceptable behaviours (on the part of the main three characters). But I am a 35yo woman who is able to disassociate myself from the "romance" and fairytale of it all. They are only now learning about love. I want them to choose just about anyone apart from Bella to be their role model!
Kids aren't stupid. Most of the people I know who like Twilight are adults. Mostly late 20s to mid 30s, and mostly educated professionals. A few are men, most are women. People tend to assume that those readers will "get" that Bella shouldn't be a role model, but somehow kids reading the book are too dumb to grasp it. My daughter, who loved the series when she was 13 or so, said Bella was an idiot and you just wanted to slap her. Neither her nor any of her friends thought Bella was a role model to be emulated. Didn't stop them loving the series, though. Bella is a character. Just because a book has an MC does not mean that anyone reading the book should assume the MC is meant to be a role model (and in most books I read they certainly should not be role models). One interesting turn of events relating to the series is that I think its reached the point where people obsessed with bashing Twilight spend more time thinking and obsessing over the books than the fans do.
I think this is pretty much right. And boy are Twilight-haters so annoying! I don't have much love for the series myself but, my god.
I'm going to go with luck --- I'm also going to go with the fact that the publishers knew they had something that was disturbingly simple, movie potential, and easy as hell to read with a decent plot (cept for book four, that was terrible). It was gold.
